What is: Effect > Path > Outline Object & Outline Stroke for?

[Mathias17]

They've mystified me since I noticed them.

Lords of Illustrator, forgive your humble servant's blatant ignorance, but searches and experimentation have come up disinsightful (possible a new word) - what do you do with these?

(Right now, I'm making a focused effort to figure out everything I can do with live Appearance Panel effects - the more I know, the better I feel I set up artwork, non-destructively. It's great. Correct Answer will manifest happy dancing.)

[Larry G. Schneider]

Using an Effect is just a way to nondestructively do the same thing as Object>Path>Outline Object or Outline Stroke. Set up two of the same objects and compare the results.

[Mathias17]

Ok.

[Kurt Gold]

Among other things they are useful (and often required) in conjunction with Pathfinder effects.

Are you interested in some sample files for detection?

[Mathias17]

Heh, sure Kurt. Thank you for your time. And, just to be clear - what I'm interested most in is dispelling my ignorance. Anything that achieves that is a wonderful thing.

[Jesseham]

A simple example - In the case of Outline Stroke, basically it would have susequent effects operate on the resulting outlined object (the one on the right) as opposed to the stroke (left example)

It is an odd one to puzzle out, as by itself, it appears to do nothing. And yeah, the appearance panel kicks ass.  I remember the epiphany when I discovered it and was like "wow - I've been doing it ALL wrong..."  [edit:] Amusingly (well, now anyway) the other "oh my god" moment was finding offset path and realizing that I didn't have to do it by hand.

[Mathias17]

Ah! Excellent.

(know exactly what you mean about the Aha! moments.)

Could you also give an example of Outline Object working?

[emil emil]

Download this and check the Outline effects example file

ftp://tpettit.best.vwh.net/AI_10_Style_demos.zip

[Mathias17]

Wow! So much I don't know . . .

Thank you!

(drew these guys just yesterday, they would like to dance for you now)

[emil emil]

Thanks Mathias, this is one very cool illustration!

To be clear, these files are not mine and I don't know who made them, they are floating on the web and I happened to have the ftp link in my bookmarks.

[Larry G. Schneider]

The artist/engineer is Teri Pettit who's name you will find in the Credits list for Illustrator. She's been with Adobe since the early days of Illustrator and has contributed greatly to the product.

[Jesseham]

She also used to be one of the few Adobe employees who would slum it down here in with us lowly users.  It's been a few years since she's been here.  She taught me the awesome secret bat cave trick to determine the area of an irregular shape.

[emil emil]

There you go, credits go to Teri then. Pasted the name in my bookmark.

[_scott__]

I love the Appearance panel.

A bit of fun just to explore options with it... one circle, then appearance panel.

[Mathias17]

CRIKEY

That's amazing. I had no idea things this complex were possible with the Appearance Panel. If you link that file I'd love to check it out.

[Jesseham]

Okay, that is awesome.  At first, I thought you just meant for the flower part, but then I realized the stem, leaves and water drops were in there too!

[_scott__]

Yup. It's all only 1 single circle (you can see the selection highlight for the circle), then the entire image is built using only the Appearance panel.

Wireframe looks like this....  O 

[Freelance_illustrator]

Nice Scott!

[_scott__]

Thanks

[Kurt Gold]

From an experimental point of view that flower is a remarkable study. No doubt.

From a pragmatical point of view it's also a remarkable study that shows how absurdly over-complicated one can construct things inside the Appearance palette which can be done easier and way more straightforward by applying "normal" transformations to simple objects.

The Appearance palette is useful, but it can also be an alluring playground that may mislead your mind.

[_scott__]

Agreed Kurt.

The point of the exercise for me was to determine at what point is it folly to continue to alter an object via the appearance panel. As well as to study performance differences. For example, I learned the Scribble effect dramatically slows down redraw. The image I posted draws in a few seconds, add a Scribble effect anywhere and that redraw time is easily quadrupled. Glows, shadows, blurs, feathers, etc. don't have that delay which the Scribble Effect provides.

Another goal was to determine just how much transformation can you accomplish and how to get past some limitations (such as the restriction to only move an object 100px via the transform effect). While I'd never actually need anything similar to the flower for real work. It is sometimes handy to know you can create multiple objects which different via the Appearance panel. For example.... eyes or ears of a comic character. That way they stay internally connected and you have less assets to manage. Set up graphic styles for eyes... and they are then just a click away.

[Kurt Gold]

I once did a (rather simple, but not too simple) topographic map just by using the Appearance palette. An enlightening experience and a sportful experiment 😉

As for the 100 px limit you mention: Isn't it 4000 px per Transform effect ?

[_scott__]

hmm.. I only get 100px/pt in any direction.

[Kurt Gold]

You're used to only take the sliders, right?

Type 2798 px into the Move field and see what happens 😉

[_scott__]

I'll be a monkey's uncle. I had no idea. Yup 4000.. THANKS for that!